Kewpies get back on track vs. Hannibal

The Hickman boys basketball team broke open a close game with a 29-point explosion in the second quarter and cruised to a 78-53 victory over Hannibal last night.

"We didn’t play well in that second quarter," Hannibal Coach Brad Kurz said. "When you let teams score that many points, you’ve dug yourself a hole that you can’t get out of. That second quarter will keep you up at night."

Kurz probably had a hard time sleeping last night, because minus that one quarter, the Pirates played the Kewpies fairly even.

"The other three quarters we did some good things but we did some bad things," Kurz said. "We can live with those other three quarters."

Hannibal led early, but Hickman rebounded to take a 13-12 advantage after one. The Kewpies (8-12) opened the second period on a 10-0 run before a Chase Dittmer bucket temporarily stopped the broke the spree.

An intentional foul call on Hannibal seemed to light a fire under Hickman, and after a pair of Ben Thelen free throws, the Kewpies responded with an 18-6 burst to lead 43-20 at halftime.

"In the first quarter, we kind of let them do what they wanted," said Ben Dierkes, who drained back-to-back 3-pointers in the barrage. Hickman Coach Kenny Ash "said to pressure the ball more, try to get them out of their comfort zone. We put the press on and forced some turnovers, and that’s when we kind of made our run."

"We had real good output of scoring in the second quarter, and defensively we shut them down," Ash said. "Hats off to our kids for that outstanding job

Admitting it sounded "cliché," Ash said the Hickman boys basketball team just had to play hard last night against Hannibal (2-18) and shake off the aftereffects of a loss to Rock Bridge on Thursday.

"We just needed to come out, to play hard and compete" Ash said. "They had been struggling like us. We knew we could use our athleticism and quickness to our advantage."

"I just played my hardest to make up for how bad we played against Rock Bridge," Thomas said.

"Michael is a great rebounder offensively and defensively," Ash said. "We definitely needed that tonight from him. We were able to get in there and use some of his height to his advantage to score and disrupt some of their offense."

Dierkes added 13 points for Hickman. John Reese scored 12.

Randall Mosley led Hannibal with a game-high 34 points - 14 from the foul line.

"He felt like the guy guarding him couldn’t contain him without fouling," Kurz said. "He did a nice job of getting to the line, and then toward the end he kind of got the hot hand."

Ash said he hoped last night’s win would inspire the Kewpies when they go on the road later this week for games against Ozark and Logan-Rogersville.

"We’ll have our hands full," Ash said. "Hopefully this win will gives us some confidence to go down there, get after it and get two wins."